You get bombs by destroying merchant ships, and can place the bomb by selecting a hex and pressing Y. Towns will require some damage first as 1 bomb isn't enough to destroy even the weakest town at full health.
Don't worry about getting this as soon as you get a bomb. There are later levels where the merchant ships only drop bombs.

http://www.xbox360achievements.org/images/achievements/678/+rc2QA==.jpg Flushed Away - 15GS
Use a whirlpool curse to teleport an enemy that is attacking your town.

The enemy must be attacking your town, so must be in one of the hexes immediately next to it. If they start to capture your town you won't get the achievement. Place the whirlpool under the enemy, but you may need to be close to attack them to make sure they move back onto the whirlpool.

http://www.xbox360achievements.org/images/achievements/678/+JY-9Q==.jpg Cherry Picker - 15GS
Capture a neutral town after the enemy has destroyed its defenses.

Easier with large towns as it gives you more time to realise they are attacking it. Just sit back and wait for the enemy to destroy the defenses and start capturing. Move onto a hex next to the town to block the capture, destroy the enemy and capture the town.

http://www.xbox360achievements.org/images/achievements/678/+XbHZg==.jpg Boom Boom - 15GS
Sink two enemy ships with a single bomb.

You can get bombs from merchant ships, and it's best to leave this to a level where they only drop bombs. Wait for two enemy ships to attack a town and place a bomb between them.

Beat all the challenges on easy. There are seven challenges you need to beat for this, and they will show a red star jewel when completed. All of the easy challenges are straight forward and shouldn't be a problem.

http://www.xbox360achievements.org/images/achievements/678/+7Er+w==.jpg On the Account - 25GS
Beat all medium challenges.

Beat all the challenges on medium. There are seven challenges you need to beat for this, and they will show a green star jewel when completed.

Beat all the challenges on hard. There are seven challenges you need to beat for this, and they will show a silver star jewel when completed.

Many hard challenges also come with a time limit. If you capture the required number of towns before the time runs out you win instantly. If you get to the end of the time limit and you have the most towns, you win. If you are tied on towns with another player it is a stalemate and doesn't count as a win.

So this part of the guide doesn't look cluttered, see below for more advice on beating the final hard challenge.

There are 21 challenges split into 3 difficulties. If you do enough to get each of the difficulty achievements above you will get this when you complete the last challenge in the last difficulty. There are a total of 21 challenges to get this, and each will fill in with a coloured star shaped jewel to show which you have completed.

http://www.xbox360achievements.org/images/achievements/678/+843HA==.jpg Sea Legs - 10GS
Win a game in Player Match.

Unlike most games where Player Match means unranked and is therefore easy to boost, in this game Player Match is Ranked. The easiest way is to get on a team of either 2 or 4 that have microphones and use them. Pair up and you should have no trouble taking towns against an unorganised team.

http://www.xbox360achievements.org/images/achievements/678/-mzc5Q==.jpg Old Salt - 30GS
Win 10 games in Player Match.

The same as for Sea Legs, but win 10 matches.

===========
General Advice
===========

The final hard challenge was tricky and took several attempts. The enemy start with more ships and have several upgrades. Don't consider fighting them directly without the support of a town until you have upgraded your ship a lot. My preferred upgrades (when I could afford them) went Speed, Cannon x3, Speed x2, Armor last.

I start by takking Nassau directly below the start, then focus on getting resources from the small villages and boxes. Attack merchant ships to get resource steals, as the most important resource on this map is gold. Taking the central town with (the only) 2 gold deposits will help you hugely, but often gets taken by much larger ships very early on. This isn't always a bad thing, as they are destroying a fully upgraded neutral town, and you only have to destroy a basic one to steal it back :)

Where other maps may have taught you to expand quickly, here it is best to stick with just one or two towns and get them fully upgraded. Once done they still aren't invincible, but the AI prefers fighting weaker towns, or just fight amongst themselves. Let them destroy each others upgraded towns so you can attack much weaker ones.

This tactic relies on the AI constantly fighting each other. Sometimes you get lucky and they keep each other at 1 or 2 towns, but sometimes one will get 4 towns very quickly. If you're unlucky there is very little you can do about it as they have much more powerful ships, and more of them, right from the start.

Avenger1324 - 2nd in world to get 200/200 GS on Age of Booty (MyGamerCard.net)

Mecandes

10-16-2008, 05:29 PM

Yeah, the Achievements in this one are so straightforward that they hardly need a guide -- you'll end up getting most without even trying -- perhaps more useful would be a strategy guide for the harder Challenges?

5 Medium "In Too Deep: Barrel o' Monkeys" was tricky, where your two ships were up against four on a tiny map with just two towns; required careful timing, but mostly just a whole lot o' piratey luck. One strategy might be to capture the southern city (if you are lucky the four enemy ships occasionally target the northern city at game start), and then hold it long enough to upgrade the defenses... giving you breathing room to take the northern city.

7 Medium "Rum and Candy: Bloody Spoils" is also proving challenging... if unable to get five towns, perhaps holding the lead at the end of the time limit is enough?

Avenger

10-16-2008, 07:43 PM

The problem with writing a guide for each level is that the AI doesn't do the same things in the same order each time. Sometimes they will attack the closest target to them, other times they pick another target and attack that. Even with the level you mentioned with just two towns, they can attack either. The final hard challenge was the only one that took me more than 2 attempts, and what the 4 other teams did was different every time.

As for levels with time limits - simply having the most towns at the end of the time is enough to win the level. All hard challenges have time limits, and some of the later medium and easy challenges have them.

IamTheKoP

10-17-2008, 07:48 AM

Figured I'd add this before anyone asks... No, the difficulty achievements DO NOT stack. Each difficulty has it's own set of different challenges.

Also, the online ones can be gotten with a local partner on live. My friend and I just did it,

PG13

10-20-2008, 07:54 AM

The challenges can't be done in multiplayer, or?

n8ryder

10-21-2008, 04:06 AM

Edit: Finished the last story mission---thanks for the tips. A lot of the missions are trial and error and you're always worrying about your dumb A.I. partner. No worries. Got 200/200 and it's still my favorite XBLA game.

Also, Ill throw this out there. If you're having trouble getting the Boom Boom achievement, it can be obtained on a custom map. I created a small-ish map with me vs. 2 A.I. opponents, worked great.

montrossity

11-07-2008, 12:47 AM

great guide!

WillSci

11-11-2008, 06:54 PM

Here's a simple guide for Medium - Mission 5, the first one that bothered me. This took me a dozen tries so I thought I'd share my tested strategy.

This has the two towns in a 2 vs 4 situation. Though the enemy AI is supposed to be random in choosing its first city, 9 times out of 10 they went for the south. This works better for gaining the upper hand. Here's the strategy I came up with. Basically, let them take the south and weaken the north, steal the northern capture, hold and upgrade it, then upgrade your ship's speed, then armor. Take the south when you're upgraded and they are weakened.

Detailed guide:

Go immediately south after any loose crates, villages, merchant ships. Clear out these resources now as you'll never return for them.
Your partner AI will go north and waste his time. Let him be.
Next, go after any central crates or merchant ships, avoiding the path of the enemy to keep your health. You can also pick off any merchants/villages that are close to the inlet of the southern town, but get in and get out before they finish with the southern city.
Head northeast to to allow the enemy to move past you to the northern city, maybe picking off another merchant. Let them start their attack, and then flank any of the weaker ships to pick them off after the city is down to about a third of its health.
If you time this part right, you can steal from the sunken enemies and then steal the city capture.
Guard the city. Your partner AI will finally be useful. Keep stealing resources when they sink. Let your city heal you and keep it recharged.
As you accumulate resources, upgrade the city until its maxed out. Finally you will be able to make the trip home to upgrade your ship. You might find a chance when you only have one city upgrade, but make sure they have 3/4 ships heading back to their port.
Get speed first. Your armor doesn't matter until the end. You might also pick off some merchants or crates in the middle while staying close to the north.
To setup the final attack, you will need to guard the north city and get it to 100% health, and pick off a merchant for a bomb. Ideally, there will be another merchant close to the middle/south so you can bomb, then pick up another bomb/whirlpool on the way.
With your ally at full health, injure the enemies but don't finish them, so they head home. 2/4 retreating should suffice. Plant the bomb and rush south to capture.

GGS DADDY

12-16-2008, 09:44 PM

Does anyone have a successful strategy for beating Level 7 in Medium? AI is so stupid and I've tried this level about 30 times....

IanCFitz

01-03-2009, 04:46 AM

Does anyone have a successful strategy for beating Level 7 in Medium? AI is so stupid and I've tried this level about 30 times....

i'm having a hell of a time with this level as well

Chuppernicus

02-22-2009, 11:57 PM

Level 7 on medium is proving to be a tough challenge for me as well. The silly AI Pete has no strategy that I can see. He just wanders around trying to take towns and rarely tries to help me.

The problem is the green team is always left alone and captures the northern cites near their base and the brown team attacks the lower towns near my base. I can never keep the 3 southern bases long enough to get the win and Ol' Pete always decides to not defend a city and go attack some far off port. Brown team rarely goes north and green team comes north once it has 3 towns. I tried capturing the northern most city and then using it as a staging port for my attacks but Ol' Pete never comes up to help and I'm too far away from my base to go get upgraded. I almost had a tie my last game I played. I've tried to 3 times now.

jdobem

03-29-2009, 11:52 PM

Ok, i finally did it tonight (Level 7 Medium).
Here's my tips:
Start with the middle bottom town, the one with Wood. Then attack both towns nearby (one on each side).
That way you get 3 towns and they are relatively easy to defend from attacks if you dont stray too far.
I managed to get upgrades for the towns, one for each so they can defend themselves for a little while.
I failed a lot of times because AS you all know the AI sucks!

Now, the time i finally won, the AI managed to win 2 small cities on the top. Et voila!

But its really down to chance. I noticed Green is usually very strong fast so no use trying to steal from them. In my several plays the Brown team seems to be easier to take down. The town on the right is always a target for me.
But really its a lot of chance or luck, as per my experience.
Hope the AI doesnt screw too much, try to defend your 3 towns and if possible win the fourth. Eventually the AI will get another one.
Also, as it gets near the end, the enemy AI gets a lot more aggressive so you'll lose if you can finish it sooner.

My two cents.
J.

A 2rue boofer

12-29-2009, 07:55 AM

Nice Guide, How long does this game take to 200.

benisjamin

02-26-2010, 04:51 AM

Does anyone know if the other team quits, do you get a win?

Jayp81

03-03-2010, 12:38 AM

Great game.

goomer pie

04-09-2010, 11:48 AM

hey guys,can you do co-op on the challenges?

David x360a

04-09-2010, 08:25 PM

Does anyone know if the other team quits, do you get a win?

No, it gets registered as a stalemate. Pretty lame, but there it is..

hey guys,can you do co-op on the challenges?

Sadly, no..

ianke_2002

04-15-2010, 06:00 PM

can someone please give me some kind of pointers for this?....i am getting owned on challenge 3 easy...just some general tips for the game....because i cant seem to do anything right...we just keep trading towns back and forth and then 30 minutes later i just end up losing...i cant seem to get any ground on this game.

mrbonelly

08-16-2010, 04:17 PM

Also, the online ones can be gotten with a local partner on live. My friend and I just did it,

What do you mean by "local partner"? meaning in one console vs other players in ranked match via xbox live?

tspires01

03-01-2011, 10:06 PM

What do you mean by "local partner"? meaning in one console vs other players in ranked match via xbox live?

just sign in multiple xbl accounts and :uzi:away

tspires01

03-01-2011, 10:07 PM

this game was easy. the hard difficulty was no where in comparison to the medium difficulty.

WilliamRLBaker

03-06-2011, 04:02 AM

hell I had loads of problems with the harder difficulties over the medium specially on challenge 3 hard 2 and you against 4 enemy AI it seems every time I'd get a ship ugprade ready the game would just give the enemy a pilfer curse and they wouldn't kill a single merchant ship. got it eventually by pure blind luck.